Governance and Global Affairs Blog - Electionshttps://www.governanceandglobalaffairsblog.nl/
enj.e.van.doorn@fgga.leidenuniv.nlCopyright 20182018-11-13T11:51:00+00:00The Hartz Reforms Revised: How Determining was the Hartz Commission’s Report?https://www.governanceandglobalaffairsblog.nl/articles/the-hartz-reforms-revised-how-determining-was-the-hartz-commissions-report
https://www.governanceandglobalaffairsblog.nl/articles/the-hartz-reforms-revised-how-determining-was-the-hartz-commissions-report#When:07:57:00ZMore than one decade ago the Hartz laws reformed the German labour market. To what extent can the Hartz II law still be traced back to its underlying expert report?]]>

A long period of uncertainty followed the latest German elections in 2017, until the recent vote of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) members finally ended the dispute over a new grand coalition. The government formation has been preceded by a heated election campaign in which SPD chancellor candidate Schulz reopened the controversial debate over the Hartz reforms. The report underlying these reforms was developed by the Commission for Modern Services on the Labour Market (2002), the so-called Hartz Commission, named after the head of the Commission, Peter Hartz. While the Hartz IV law is certainly the most well-known law, other laws also provide deep insight into the influence of experts on German politics. How influential has, for example, the Hartz report been on the policy process of the second law on modern services in the labour market (Hartz II)? As the figure below shows, the report lost a big part of its influence throughout the legislative process leading to Hartz II.

It had all started with a political scandal: In January 2002, the Federal Court of Audit noted that only one third of the unemployed being counted as having found a job by the former employment agency had actually found a job according to the legal definition. High public attention caused the government to task the Hartz Commission, consisting of fifteen members

from the public and private sphere, to design a new employment agency. The members of the panel were selected by the Office of the Federal Chancellor, former employment minister Walter Riester from the SPD and Peter Hartz, which is a good reflection of how politicians and experts cooperate in Germany. Public policy scholars call this a coordinated knowledge regime. The Commission then independently extended its mission to the development of an overall labour market concept.

High unemployment rates before the 2002 federal elections forced former chancellor Schröder to welcome the Commission’s advice on labour market reform. He promised a full implementation in his election campaign, putting it at the top of the political agenda. Hartz II incorporated two modules of the report: the creation of job centres and new incentives to formalize work. These were divided into the creation of Me-incorporated (Ich-AG) which refers to sole proprietorships founded by an unemployed and a new regulation concerning mini-jobs. But Schröder couldn’t keep his promise to fully implement the report. Having a look at the final law, we see some major differences compared to the original report:

There was no specification of the internal organisation of job centres.

The benefit scheme for Ich-AGs was calculated differently.

A lower ceiling and sharper taper rate for mini-jobs was introduced.

Workers having mini-jobs pay almost no social security contributions.

The evaluation process further challenged the implementation of the original proposal, leading to the decision to abolish Ich-AGs in 2006 by the grand coalition due to financial reasons. The coalition of the Christian Democrats and the Liberals further raised the minijob ceiling in 2013 as inflation compensation. Concluding, the commission managed to put the issue on the agenda and to form the basis of the Hartz II law, but the expert report was politicized throughout the legislative process, missing its original point. In the end, it had only a limited influence on the law that is currently still in place. The Social Democrats might have given up on reforming the Hartz laws by joining another grand coalition. Nonetheless, the designated health minister, Jens Spahn, has just been criticised as “cold and aloof” by the Greens and the Left Party for his recent comments about Hartz IV. The debate on the Hartz laws is therefore likely to continue in the upcoming years.

]]>Elections, Public Affairs,2018-03-26T07:57:00+00:00Care to Vote? Vote for Care!https://www.governanceandglobalaffairsblog.nl/articles/care-to-vote-vote-for-care
https://www.governanceandglobalaffairsblog.nl/articles/care-to-vote-vote-for-care#When:11:53:00ZAfter the decentralization of long-term care in the Netherlands in 2015 it is important than ever to let our voices be heard in the municipal elections. ]]>

On Wednesday March 21, Dutch citizens will vote in the municipal elections. It will be interesting to see how many people turn out. Local elections generally do not inspire much enthusiasm. In the 2014 municipal elections turnout was a mere 54%1. Nevertheless, the upcoming elections are more important than ever: they are the first municipal elections, after the decentralization of several social policy domains, including long-term care (LTC), in 2015. This means that municipalities now have the authority over this policy area instead of the central state. If Dutch citizens want to exert their democratic right to influence LTC, they best do it on March 21.

The Netherlands was one of the first countries with a universal LTC insurance system, the Exceptional Medical Expenses Act (AWBZ, 1968). Almost half a century after its initiation, the AWBZ was dissolved in 2015, because the costs of this scheme were going through the roof. The Dutch government spent a whopping 4.3% of its GDP on LTC, making it the most expensive care of all OECD countries2. The recent restructuring of the Dutch LTC system can thus be said to be a case of welfare state retrenchment.

Political scientists have formulated an answer to the question why exactly welfare states are so hard to reform, let alone retrench. Paul Pierson3 famously introduced ‘The New Politics of the Welfare State’ theory, explaining there is an inherent negativity bias in welfare state retrenchment, which changes its political dynamic. The negativity bias explains that individuals have stronger negative feelings towards losing the things they have than positive feelings about gaining something new of an equal value. Instead of openly fighting for interests, the politics of welfare state retrenchment is thus characterized by blame avoidance. No politician wants to take responsibility for unpopular budget cuts in the welfare state and thus they try to lower the visibility of reforms by making the effects of policies hard to detect or by making it hard to trace responsibility for the policy changes.

However, I argue that this strategy of welfare state retrenchment does not work in a country like the Netherlands, which has a conservative-corporatist political culture. The liberal-labour coalition that eventually implemented the policy change in 2015 did not try to avoid blame at all: both parties openly promoted a similar policy change in their election promises4,5. Instead, Dutch LTC restructuring is better explained by tracing the process of implementation and focusing on policy discourse, following the example of Sciences-Po scholar Bruno Palier6. LTC restructuring in the Netherlands was a long process of strategic agreements between different interest groups. Moreover, politicians used ambiguous framing to convince voters of the need to reform, such as “care closeby”, “own responsibility”, being “in charge of your own life”, and “participation”4,5,7,8. These frames are all so vague, that it is hard to disagree with them. The dissolution of the AWBZ was thus stooled on broad social consensus, which makes this a perfect illustration of corporatist political culture.

From this perspective, the restructuring of the Dutch LTC scheme does not seem controversial at all. It’s all the more surprising that LTC was a hot topic in the Dutch national election of March 2017. Current controversies focused on the execution of this decentralized policy by the municipalities. Relatives of State Secretary for Health, Welfare and Sport, Martin van Rijn, even publicly complained about the elderly care they were receiving!9 Blame avoidance thus re-entered the policy process after the LTC reform was implemented: the new Rutte government was forced to promise to big investments in elderly care, at the sum of €2,1 billion to “meet the new norms of quality care”10.

We need a good turnout on March 21: while the Minister or State Secretary of Health are being addressed for problems in elderly care, little emphasis is put on holding the responsible alderman within the municipalities similarly accountable. If you do care, go vote in these municipal elections.

]]>Elections, Public Affairs, Dutch Government,2018-03-20T11:53:00+00:00How Mugabe lost his iron grip on Zimbabwehttps://www.governanceandglobalaffairsblog.nl/articles/how-mugabe-lost-his-iron-grip-on-zimbabwe
https://www.governanceandglobalaffairsblog.nl/articles/how-mugabe-lost-his-iron-grip-on-zimbabwe#When:15:20:00ZThe recent fall of the Zimbabwean leader Robert Mugabe led to a wave of hope and joy in the country. How was Mugabe able to survive his declining popularity?]]>

THE REIGN OF MUGABE

When Mugabe came into power Zimbabwe was the bread basket of Southern Africa. At the end of his reign many people had fled the country and those still there had to deal with a lack of everything (e.g. food, medical supplies, and money in the ATMs).

Mugabe came into power in 1980 and earned his popularity in Zimbabwe’s struggle for independence from the British rulers. Zimbabwe as acountry is also defined by its tribal structure. Early in his reign it became clear that Mugabe favoured his own tribe, the Shona, over the other tribe called Ndebele. After realising that the Ndebele tribe did not support his government, Mugabe declared a one-party state. He trained soldiers, known as the 5th brigade to target the Ndebele tribe resulting in the massacre of approximately 20,000 Ndebele’s.

The dissatisfaction with Mugabe’s reign led to the establishment of a strong opposition in the form of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in 1999. In an attempt to gain support from the black majority in the country, Mugabe implemented the land reform in which the land was taken back from British farmers. However, besides the land being unfairly redistributed, the land reform led to sanctions that brought the country to its knees. Inflation shot up, companies closed down and unemployment went up to over 90%.

Mugabe’s position was contested again after he lost the elections in 2008. However, these elections were declared a stalemate and in preparation for the re-run Mugabe intimidated his opposition. This resulted in the withdrawal of the opposition and the continuation of Mugabe’s reign. Now Mugabe had to deal with a serious declining economy. In order to change the tides, he formed a unity government with the leader of the opposition as the Prime minister. This had the desired effect and with the adoption of the US dollar as the surrogate currency, there was a significant revival of the economy around 2010. In the midst of these economically positive developments, Mugabe changed his mind, aborting the unity government, and putting himself in place again as the sole leader of Zimbabwe.

MUGABE`S FALL

Time appeared to be Mugabe’s biggest enemy. Aged 93, there was a need to organise his succession leading to a division in his party Zanu-PF. There was the faction G40 (i.e. party members in their 40’s) led by Mugabe’s wife Grace. On the other hand, there was the faction called Lacoste led by Vice-president Emerson better known as the “crocodile”. A nickname he earned for his ruthlessness in and outside the political arena. The unpopular Grace, also known as Gucci Grace after her shopping sprees, started rallying around the country and denouncing Emerson in the media. In support of his wife Mugabe dismissed a number of Lacoste ministers and finally dismissed Emerson.

The dismissal of Emerson and the attempt to put his wife in place was the last straw and the army stepped in. Mugabe was placed under house arrest and forced to hand over power. Which he did not without struggle. On the 21st of November, Mugabe ceased his resistance and resigned just as the parliament had gathered to vote for impeachment.

THE FUTURE

Now with Emerson as head of the interim government Zimbabweans feel that there has been a break through. As Emerson, a former member of Mugabe’s regime, has been part of the problem, the real question people ask themselves is will he also be part of the solution? With the economy on the brink of death, will Emerson be able to attract the so much needed new foreign investors? Will he indeed lead a government that put the need of its people before their own? And will there in the end be a truly democratic regime? Only time will be able to give answers to these questions.